Eldora Speedway
Late drama shakes up Dream's final stretch run
By Kyle McFadden
DirtonDirt staff reporter
The top-three finishers in the Dream finale. (joshjamesartwork.com)
ROSSBURG, Ohio (June 6) — In an instant, the complexion of Saturday’s 100-lap Dream XXXII finale at Eldora Speedway changed dramatically with 21 laps remaining.
When Brandon Sheppard’s right-front tire blew out on lap 79, sending his car up the turn-three banking and into the path of third-running Hudson O’Neal, both of Bobby Pierce’s closest challengers were eliminated in a matter of seconds. Moments later, fifth-running Tyler Erb — who would’ve inherited third for the restart — peeled into the hot pit. | Complete Dream coverage
Just like that, Max Blair and Nick Hoffman were elevated to second and third, going from simply trying to salvage top-10 finishes to suddenly finding themselves with an unexpected shot at tracking down Pierce in the race for $100,000 over the final 21 laps.
“Hell, with 40 to go, I was still back in 10th. At that point I was done,” Hoffman said. “But then I was able to get back to third. … It just worked out great at the end. The track came to me. I was able to get to third.”
Blair, meanwhile, never viewed the late-race shakeup as an opening to challenge Pierce. Even after inheriting second and becoming the closest car to the leader, the 36-year-old from Centerville, Pa., believed the race was still firmly in Pierce’s control.
“No … no. He’s just really good. That’s really all it is,” Blair said when asked whether he thought he had anything for Pierce after moving from fifth to second in the lap-79 incident. “The end of the race there, we were running about the exact same line — and similar lap times the last 10-15 laps also.”
Pierce, on the other hand, wasn’t entirely convinced he had his first Dream victory in the bag. Following Sheppard’s misfortune — which Pierce acknowledged “is not a fun feeling when that happens” — he admitted he “was a little worried about” suffering a similar tire failure. Then again, Pierce had been conscious all race long of not overworking his equipment.
“With how my car was handling, I wasn’t being as hard on the right-front,” Pierce said. “The car was kind of steering itself. I wasn’t really having to crank on the wheel much. It was a sigh of relief seeing him out of the race, but I did feel really bad for him, especially for Hudson having nowhere to go.”
Devin Moran, meanwhile, quietly worked his way to fourth from the 12th starting spot with 14 laps remaining. Two nights earlier, he had led the opening 30 laps of Thursday’s 50-lap preliminary feature before yielding to Pierce. Did Moran think he had enough speed late Saturday to reel in Blair and Hoffman — and perhaps even mount a challenge to Pierce?
“Not really, honestly. I was just trying to get whoever is next in front of me,” Moran said. “I was committed to the cushion once I got up there because once you get your tires hot you get to that point. Yeah, like I said, Bobby was really good. When we saw this rain today and that happened, we expected him to be really good.”
The lap-79 crash that eliminated Sheppard and O’Neal opened the door for Moran, too. Running 11th at the time, Moran suddenly found himself seventh and within the first four rows for the ensuing restart. The Dresden, Ohio, driver capitalized, picking off three more positions on that ensuing restart. By the time he reached fourth, the two-time Dream runner-up knew a caution flag was likely his only remaining chance to make things interesting at the front.
“Really, when Huddy and Shepp — I didn’t see what happened there — when that happened, I advanced up to seventh at that point,” Moran said. “I felt like I had a decent car at that point there in the race, got up to fourth and really praying for a caution once I got up to fourth. I really don’t think I could’ve won without a doubt — Bobby was that good.”
Moran hoped for a late-race caution parting the seas for him one more time. In his mind, Blair almost certainly would've taken his shot at Pierce on the bottom lane, potentially opening the top for Moran to build momentum and attack. Of course, the opportunity never materialized. Instead, Moran lost fourth to Dale McDowell with five laps remaining and settled for a fifth-place finish.
“Max was starting to his outside, so you know he was going to dive to the bottom,” Moran said. “I wanted to try and ring that top, but all in all, it was a solid weekend for us after the last month-and-a-half to run top-five all three nights.”
While he shouldered the blame that “it took me too long to get going” through the first half of the race, Hoffman also credited Eldora’s track crew for giving him a chance to contend at all. Starting 15th on a surface that was nearly a half-second faster at the start of the night than it was at the same point last year following a short but intense late-afternoon thunderstorm that delay the start of action for about 90 minutes, Hoffman believed the track’s evolution ultimately created passing opportunities throughout the field.
Chris Ferguson’s fast lap of 15.097 seconds in the first heat Saturday compared to Tim McCreadie’s 15.521-second benchmark in last year’s opening heat illustrated just how much speed the surface retained.
“They did a great job with the racetrack. (Eldora general manager) Levi (Jones) takes that video (after the late-afternoon rain), and he’s standing there in 6 inches of water,” Hoffman said. “Any other racetrack, we’re done. They did a great job of getting it turned around. We had something to lean on early, and Bobby was able to charge through the field. Then late in the race, we had guys like myself, Max, Dale (McDowell), that are middle-bottom, and I was able to roll right up through there.”
Blair even admitted concerns himself later in his postrace press conference, but, like Hoffman, was pleasantly surprised with the outcome.
“I was definitely concerned. This place is awesome,” Blair said. “So I knew by feature time, it would come around. I was in an early heat race, so I was concerned about that. But it all worked out. I didn’t know what to expect in that heat race, but the racetrack came around way faster than I thought it would.”
